Sicarii 1

  SICARII

  Part I

  Adrienne Wilder

  Contents

  Untitled

  Untitled

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  About the Author

  Sicarii

  Copyright 2020 Adrienne Wilder

  Cover art by Adrienne Wilder

  The following is a work of fiction and not based on anyone living or dead. All people, the town, the events are works from the writer’s imagination.

  Please don’t distribute all or in part, by any means, without written permission from the writer. Please do not upload or give away when purchased as an e-book.

  This is my livelihood and without it I can’t afford to write. I know some people don’t think this is a job because I do enjoy telling these stories, but it doesn’t change the fact I spend hundreds, sometimes thousands of hours putting these books together. In many cases they can take years to complete.

  Piracy isn’t harmless. Piracy is a crime. Piracy hurts writers.

  Created with Vellum

  Sicarii plural form of Sicarius: Latin for dagger-men

  For the sake of simplicity, and since this is fiction, Sicarii will

  be used as both singular and plural.

  1

  The killer watched.

  Light bled from Sam Water’s window, backlighting his silhouette. The pencil danced in his hand. Whatever drove him from his bed must have been important. He was up early, even for a school day.

  Marcel leaned against the porch railing and coaxed a cigarette from the package in his hand. The momentary flame from the lighter outlined the web of scar tissue across his palm and three and a half fingers. The car bomb had also spared his thumb. A good thing. Learning how to write with his left hand would have been a bitch.

  Not that an old dog couldn’t be taught a new trick. He was no old dog, but the teachings ingrained in him had been done so under conditions leaving no room for change.

  The cherry of his cigarette flared in the darkness.

  Night in this suburban neighborhood was nothing like where he’d grown up. Tucked in the mountains, there were only the stars, the moon, and the occasional candle. There the darkness wasn’t just a state of being. It was a living thing. All-consuming and unforgiving, conspiring with the wilderness to kill those too weak to survive.

  Here the darkness was just a veil; once lifted, life returned, shattering any chance of reaching such perfection.

  The storm door to the house opened, and the wooden slats on the porch creaked.

  Mild green tea and aloe mixed with the honeysuckle blooming along the split rail fence nestled between the houses. The heat left over from the shower clung to Jacob’s skin.

  “I wish you wouldn’t smoke.” In the darkness, there was only the sound of his breathing, the rustle of his clothes, the weight of his body pressing against the space around Marcel. A space that shrank to nothing with another small step.

  Jacob’s caress traced the line of Marcel’s jaw. Layers of scars disrupted the gentle movement.

  “Did you find your money?” Marcel exhaled a stream of bitter smoke.

  “You gave me too much again.”

  “It is a tip. For…you know. Good service.”

  Jacob teased his fingers down the back of Marcel’s neck. There was more in his touch than physical contact. There was longing, yearning, endless want. But Marcel would never be able to give the man what he yearned for.

  “You don’t need to tip me. You already give me so much.”

  “I make you live in a motel.”

  “Only because it’s close.”

  “I could buy you a house.” The tip of the cigarette flared. Jacob was right, he shouldn’t smoke. Damn things never tasted like anything but shit.

  “I don’t want a house.”

  “You should. You are young. Young people should want a house. A family. A car. You have nothing.”

  Jacob rested his cheek on Marcel’s shoulder. “I have you.”

  “Nothing.” Marcel snuffed out the cigarette between his finger and thumb, then slid the butt into his shirt pocket. “You should go. Get some sleep.”

  “I napped.”

  Marcel cupped Jacob’s chin. He didn’t need the light to know how Jacob pleaded with his eyes.

  Marcel saw it every time they were together. “No. I have told you many times.”

  “Maybe I keep hoping.”

  “It is a waste.”

  “I don’t see it like that.”

  “I could let you go. I could give you enough to go wherever you wanted. Back to school, maybe. What was it you wanted to do again?”

  “I don’t want to go to school.”

  “You should.”

  “I’m happy.”

  “You need more than an old man’s cock in your ass. You could go back and get your degree.”

  “It takes years to be a doctor, and that dream sailed a long time ago.”

  He was young enough to catch up to it. Or simply change direction altogether. All Jacob needed was motivation. A reason to want more. Someway for him to see there was more.

  Marcel leaned down, and Jacob tipped his face up, leaving his mouth an inch, maybe less, but definitely not more, away from Marcel’s.

  “You need to save those for someone you love.” Marcel traced the bow of Jacob’s lips with his thumb.

  “Maybe I have.”

  “No, Jacob. I fuck you. That is all.”

  “And I’m okay with that. I—”

  Marcel stopped him with a press of his finger. The tremor running down Jacob’s body was nothing more than a flutter of his pulse.

  Jacob swallowed. “Please don’t send me away.”

  One day Marcel would. But not today. Or tomorrow. Jacob wasn’t ready. “Friday. Ten o’clock.”

  Marcel went back to tracing Jacob’s lips. He deserved to be kissed, to be loved. But that part of Marcel had been stripped away those nights on a mountain ledge when he was a boy.

  “Go home.” He patted Jacob’s cheek. “Rest. You will need it.”

  The whisper of tennis shoes against wooden slats faded into steps of rubber soles on concrete. Then those too were gone, leaving Marcel to the darkness.

  In the window of the house next door, the boy finished writing whatever had pulled him out of bed. He folded the piece of paper in careful movements. Then he disappeared from view, and the patch of light coming from his lamp winked out.

  And the killer watched.

  “It’s a bit of a mess.” The ring of keys jingled in the super’s hand. He flipped past another half dozen, stopping every so often to squint at the numbers scratched into the metal. “Between the police, forensics, and…” He cleared his throat. “They made quite a mess of the place. The burglars took the TV. Not sure if he had anything else worth taking.”

  No, Uncle Greg didn’t have anything else worth stealing. He’d never had anything worth much at all. Just a few personal effects. Letters. Clothes. If anything was valuable, it was his books. Not because they were worth anything, but because they’d meant so much to him.

  For days after his mother left Ben with his uncle, he’d spent hours staring up at the shelves lining the walls. Shelves out of reach to curious hands. He’d imagined all kinds of secrets in those books: treasure maps, gateways through the universe, solutions to world problems.

  When Ben had climbed a chair and stolen one, he’d been more than disappointed to find the squiggled shapes inside. Then it had occurred to him maybe all those shapes strung together were a code. Otherwise, anyone could look in those books and figure out w
hy they were special.

  He must have been the only kid in kindergarten excited at the sight of those squiggled lines on the chalkboard. Then even more excited by how putting those shapes together made sounds, and then the sounds eventually made words.

  Ben had climbed back on that chair every chance he got. And every day, there was another series of letters on the pages forming a word he understood.

  Sometimes the words he knew were in there often. Other times he had to search for them. Learning the rules of those letters and their sounds had let him decipher enough to make sentences, then the sentences turned into pages. It didn’t always work, but there was enough for him to realize he’d been right

  The books did hold all those wonders he’d dreamed about. Just not in the way a child’s mind hoped.

  His uncle had caught him when he fell off the chair and knocked over a lamp.

  Ben had tried to hide the book under the sofa, but there was no hiding the blood on the pages.

  Uncle Greg carried Ben to the hospital. He earned sixteen stitches in his hand and a knot on his head. On the way home, he confessed to his uncle how he’d been reading the books.

  Ben’s uncle had never raised a hand to him, yet he feared that’s exactly what would happen. Maybe not when they got home, or the next day, but eventually Uncle Greg would discipline him for what he’d done. Uncle Greg had sent Ben to bed early. The pain pill made it impossible to stay awake, and his worries about his perceived future punishment had plagued his dreams.

  Ben had woken up to a stack of new books on his bedside table and a library card.

  It was the best gift he’d ever gotten, and he couldn’t wait to show his mother all the wondrous things he’d found in those books, but she never came back like she said she would.

  “Here it is.” The super jiggled the key in the lock. The deadbolt thumped, and the door opened. “I’ll get you a key for the new lock I put in. Since they didn’t…the door…it wasn’t.” The guy dropped his gaze. “I’ve only been here six months, and already something like this happens.”

  “It’s okay.” Ben put a hand on the super’s shoulder.

  “The cops think they had a key since there was no damage to the door.”

  “Do you know how many keys to this lock I’ve lost over the years? Even Uncle Greg lost his share. And just because there weren’t any marks, it doesn’t mean they didn’t break-in. He liked to sleep with the window open.”

  The super scrubbed a hand over his mouth. “Yeah. They mentioned that. That’s a scary climb, though. just for a TV.”

  A very old TV. Uncle Greg had still lived in the 80s. He didn’t even own a cell phone.

  Not that those things mattered anymore.

  “They probably came through the window.” Ben offered his hand to the man. He shook it. “Thanks for keeping an eye on the place until I could get back.”

  “Sure. You just let me know if you need anything, and if, if you want to stay, I’ll keep the rent at the same price he paid. Won’t be able to find an apartment that cheap anywhere else.”

  Ben nodded. “I’ll let you know.” The answer would be no thank you. But it could wait.

  The super disappeared down the stairs, and Ben stood there with his hand on the door. Brown paint cracked in spots, revealing the gray coat underneath. He’d been eleven when the original super had decided to give the hallway a makeover.

  Ben went inside.

  Papers, clothes, upturned furniture littered the floor. Near the doorway of his uncle’s bedroom, a blank spot. Forensics had taken the rug, leaving behind a reddish-brown stain in the shape of an L.

  Ben walked through the living room. The kitchen appeared intact, plates in the sink, and a full pot on the coffee maker. Whoever it was had come in before Greg woke up.

  The police said the position of the body suggested Greg had tried to make a run for the front door. And the intruder had struck him down on his way out of the bedroom.

  Detective Jones assured Ben his uncle hadn’t suffered. One clean shot to the head had ripped Greg from this world and tossed him into whatever lay in wait.

  Ben wiped his eyes.

  He’d already cried to the point of exhaustion at the funeral, but it seemed the tears still snuck out every chance they got.

  Most of the books on the shelves had been spared. Ben picked up the few on the floor. He flipped through the pages of the first one, and the scent of old paper perfumed the air.

  Ray Bradbury had been one of Greg’s favorites. Some of the old books Greg had carried with him from his childhood, but most were yard sale or thrift store finds.

  Ben put them back into their place.

  Greg hadn’t been much of a housekeeper, but he’d always been particular about his books. Spine out, upright, and alphabetical by title, not by author. When Ben asked Uncle Greg why, he’d told him titles were far more interesting than the names of the writers who wrote them.

  On the way to his uncle’s apartment, Ben had been prepared to donate everything to a local charity. Looking around now, it was unlikely there was anything even a thrift store would want. Except for the books and, somehow, giving them away felt like a violation.

  There were only a hundred give or take, but Ben’s dorm room wasn’t much bigger than a closet, and with a twin bed on one side, he barely had enough space to squeeze by the computer desk.

  But he couldn’t just abandon them. He’d figure something out. Maybe a library would take them. If not, perhaps he could give them to a school. Greg would have liked that.

  Ben found a space on the mantel beside the clock separating the line of books for the last one in his hand.

  Like everything else in the apartment, the clock was old, useless, and very broken. But it was a beautiful piece. Greg had brought it back from overseas. He never spoke much about his time there, and when he did, he’d rub the deep scar on the web of flesh between his thumb and first finger.

  An unusual shape that reminded Ben of an eye. There’d even been a circle within the two arched lines.

  Ben had walked by the clock on the mantel a thousand times or more since he was a kid. The grooves carving out the twisting limbs and leaves turned a shade close to black with age, creating shadows pushing against the highlights in the mahogany.

  The woodwork had fascinated Ben as a kid and still did.

  He traced the line of ivy to the face.

  The clock had never worked. At least not that Ben could remember. It sat forever frozen at twelve-o-one. A broken spring was probably the reason why it didn’t run, but as a child, Ben had decided something magical must have happened. A wish granted, a happy ending made, a hero born.

  The kind of moment that gave birth to the stories lining the walls of his uncle’s apartment. And the time had been eternal.

  Until now.

  The minute hand had been moved to the line nine spaces before the twelve. The hour hand sat on the four.

  Dust made a faint line a few centimeters in front of the clock. The difference between what was on the rest of the shelf suggested it had been moved recently. Had one of the forensics personnel moved it? If they did, why would they change the time?

  Familiarity nagged at the back of his mind. Like he should know the time. Like the moment meant something. A sense of familiarity with absolutely no foundation.

  And yet…

  He leaned closer. Nothing else about the clock had changed.

  Ben laid the book he held on the top of the others and picked up the clock. The weight of the piece had amazed him when he had moved it to dust. He turned it over. Even the key was still in the same position he remembered.

  Tiny brass screws held on the plate covering the back. The clockmaker’s signature was carved in the metal along with a date.

  Ben tapped the back. It didn’t sound hollow, but then it never had. He’d wanted to take it apart as a boy to see if he could fix it, but Greg had forbidden it. The ferocity of his response had shocked Ben enough to wipe out even the i
dea of sneaking a look like he had with the books.

  Thinking back, Greg’s reaction seemed a bit extreme.

  Ben carried the clock with him into the kitchen. Greg kept a junk drawer next to the fridge. It seemed that every odd and end or important tool found its way there. Ben dug through the twisty ties, coupons, random nails, screws, a hammer.

  The first screwdriver was a flat head; the second a Philips but too large. He kept digging. Surely there was a smaller one.

  Nothing. At least nothing he could use. He looked at the back again.

  No marks suggested it had been opened up since it was made. But the time had been changed. Ben looked at the screws again.

  Did they make screwdrivers small enough? The tip would have to be minuscule, almost needlelike. The tiny grooves were no wider than a razor’s edge.

  Ben snagged a steak knife from the dish drainer and carried it with him back into the living room.

  He sat on the sofa and held the clock in his lap. The tip of the knife barely fit, but it was enough to coax the screws out of their bed. Ben put the knife on the coffee table next to the screws. The metal plate slid from its place.

  Gears and springs. Small metal posts and the framework for the face.

  A broken spring hung limp between a set of gears.

  Carefully sculpted text fogged the brass plate. He held it closer, tilting the metal square until the light pushed the words from the reflective brass.

  Time is infinite.

  Yet, time ceases to exist without knowledge.

  And knowledge ceases to exist without those who protect it.

  Ben reread the words. Maybe it was a translation from another language, and that’s why it didn’t quite make sense.

  Or maybe the clockmaker was as bad a poet as he was a good craftsman.